Although piano tremolos and trills sound much the same, there are differences between how they are notated and how they sound. A trill occurs when you flutter your fingers very quickly between two notes[more…]

Whether you bought a piano or an electric keyboard, the first thing to do when you get your new baby home is to find a spot for it to live. This spot doesn't have to be a permanent resting place — pianos[more…]

The concept of using dynamic markings (which indicate the relative loudness of different sections in the music) in sheet music came about around the same time as the piano — for good reason. Before the[more…]

You couldn't read or write music without notes. If you think of music as a language, the notes are like letters of the alphabet. If you know how to recognize the notes, you can learn the language.[more…]

Reading music notes means understanding the value of each note (that is, how long each note lasts) and how notes fit together in sheet music. To know how to read music notes, you'll need to learn the different[more…]

Knowing when not to play notes during a song is as important as knowing the notes you do play. Understanding how to read rests will help you keep up with the beat and pacing of the music. Sometimes the[more…]

One of the most common ways to tune a guitar to a standard pitch is to use a piano. You need to know how to tune a guitar using a piano or some other fixed source if you want to play with other instruments[more…]

Pianos are the most popular acoustic keyboards hands down (pun intended), with a 300-year track record, an incomparable tone, and a sound-producing mechanism that has been refined to respond to every subtle[more…]

For considerably less money than you shell out for an acoustic keyboard, also known as a piano, you can own a digital keyboard capable of sounding like just about any other instrument on the planet[more…]

The first thing you notice on your piano keyboard is the not-so-colorful use of 88 black and white keys. The black ones are raised and are set farther back than the white ones. Each key on the keyboard[more…]

Depending on the type of keyboard you’re playing, you can either sit or stand while you play the piano. As a general rule, most pianists sit at the piano, but many rock keyboardists stand behind their[more…]

In piano lingo, fingering refers to using the best finger to play each note of a song, and correct fingering is always a very important part of piano playing. Even easy piano pieces have fingerings marked[more…]

If you’ve decided that a full-on piano is not for you right now — or ever — you may be in the market for a digital keyboard instead. You can rent some digital keyboards, but not all. Some of the fancier[more…]

So, you’ve made the decision to buy a digital keyboard rather than a piano. Now you must decide what type of digital keyboard you want. Any digital keyboard is a versatile instrument, giving you access[more…]

An acoustic piano does one thing — produces piano notes as you press the keys. But, with a MIDI system attached to a digital or hybrid keyboard, you can connect to and communicate with other keyboards,[more…]

Piano music is often very fluid, requiring you to shift hand positions. The best way to do this is to use a little maneuver called finger crossing. Finger crossing is one of those techniques that can be[more…]

When you play the piano, your hands are busy on the keys, and your feet are called upon to work the pedals to control other aspects of the music. The various pedals allow you to achieve different effects[more…]

If you decide to buy a digital keyboard instead of a piano, make a list of which features you need and which you don’t. For example, if you don’t tour with a band, you have no need for a feature allowing[more…]

When using printed music to play piano, the treble and bass clefs identify the notes. A clef’s sole purpose in life is to tell you the names of the lines and spaces on the staff so that you can play piano[more…]